Nissan building park for suppliers in Canton

400 new jobs created

Nissan North America will build a 1 million-square-foot campus for its suppliers just north of the company's vehicle assembly plant in Canton.

The announcement came Tuesday during a ceremony in Canton where Gov. Phil Bryant and Nissan officials spoke.

Nissan said the project will support more than 800 jobs, including 400 newly created supplier jobs, as well as 400 employees Nissan has hired since June 1 in anticipation of the project.

"Today's groundbreaking supports our efforts to bring more Nissan cars and trucks to our plant in Mississippi and means more Mississippi jobs. Additionally, the supplier park will help make us more globally competitive at our Canton, Miss., plant," said Dan Bednarzyk, Nissan vice president for total delivered cost.

Earlier this year, Mississippi lawmakers approved a bill to allow the Madison County Economic Development Authority to use $100 million in bonds toward construction of buildings to be used by suppliers of the Nissan plant.

Nissan now makes seven vehicles at the Canton plant: the Armada and Xterra SUVs, the Titan and Frontier pickup trucks, the NV van, the Altima sedan and the Sentra sedan.

The Canton plant began operations in 2003 and employs more than 5,600 people, the company said.

Canton Mayor Arnel Bolden said the city's partnership with Nissan is paying off.

"Nissan has been a good community supporter. You know, certainly they provide a support to our educational institutions, as well as, of course, provided jobs and economic development," Bolden said.